Hello ,

Ant keeping as a hobby is currently increasing and with more people keeping ants the question arises, But why keep ants?

Well, other than that ants are interesting, there are a few reasons that makes the hobby appealing to a wide range of people. The largest benefit of keeping ants are that it is a very cheap hobby, making it accessible to everyone. If you manage to collect your own queen you can start ant keeping for around two to ten rand (or less than a dollar)! Feeding a small starter colony shouldn't cost more than a few minutes a day to catch an insect or two and a teaspoon of sugar per week at the very least.

The size of the ants allow you to keep ants in a small space. This makes ant keeping the ideal hobby if you have limited space, and it still allows you to make very interesting and unique observations.

With the large variety of species to choose from there is a species guaranteed for any skill level. The amount of skill required to keep easy ant species is negligible and perfect for a beginner, while complex species are only successfully kept by novice ant keepers. The best part is that learning how to keep ants is really easy and one can start off as an absolute beginner and work your way through various species until you are able to keep specialist species!

A very cool part, that most ant keepers enjoy, is the experiments you can do with your ant colonies! Simple experiments such as how long it takes them to find food, what food they like or dislike are common. More complex experiments such as what different diet types will do to the colony growth or how increased winter temperature affects the colonies longevity are also options. The list of possible experiments that you can do with your ant colony is as far as your imagination lets you go!

If you keep ants I suggest that you keep a journal close by so that you can note down any interesting observations you make, as well as the results of all the experiments you are conducting.

So will you start ant keeping soon?

Weekly Top Shot: The start of the colony!

Highlight Video: Start your ant keeping journey!

How to set up a queen ant to start a colony — www.youtube.com

A short tutorial video on how to set up an ant queen to start a colony. This is the test tube and cotton method, specifically because it is easy to set up and...